John Calvin the Pietist

Reason #8: Calvin models for us how to bring all of life under the rubric of a biblical, comprehensive piety.

Piety was the primary reason Calvin wrote his Institutes. For Calvin, piety is best defined as the development of a right attitude toward God. This attitude includes six things: true knowledge, heartfelt worship, saving faith, filial fear, prayerful submission, and reverential love. All of these have the glory of God as their goal. Calvin’s notion of piety comprehensively impacted his worldview theologically, ecclesiastically, and practically.

Theologically, Calvin rooted piety in the believer’s mystical union with Christ, which produces communion with Christ and participation in His benefits. He viewed the Holy Spirit and saving faith as the double bond of piety, for the Holy Spirit works piety in us through faith. Then, too, Calvin presented us with the central doctrines of salvation, justification, and sanctification through the grid of piety, for justification is imputed piety and sanctification is imparted or actual piety.

Ecclesiastically, piety is nurtured through the Word and the church. The Word gives content and shape to genuine piety. The church nurtures piety through preaching, which is our spiritual food and medicine for spiritual health. The church also nurtures piety through members using their gifts to strengthen each other in the fear of God. The communion of saints encourages the growth of one another’s gifts and love, since to grow in grace, Calvin said, we are “constrained to borrow from others.” Calvin called the sacraments exercises of piety, for they help promote a right attitude to God. He defined them as testimonies “of divine grace toward us, confirmed by an outward sign, with mutual attestation of our piety toward God.” The Lord’s Supper, in particular, prompts piety of grace received and given. Psalm singing also promotes piety, Calvin argued, for the psalms are “an anatomy of parts of the soul,” and therefore relate to all of a believer’s experiential life with God.  Calvin viewed the book of Psalms as the canonical manual of piety. Practically, Calvin’s section in the Institutes (6–10) on the Christian life strongly promotes piety. Prayer is the principal and perpetual exercise of faith and the chief element of piety, both privately and corporately. Repentance, which involves both mortification (the killing of sin) and vivification (coming alive to life and righteousness in Christ), is the way of piety. God has always intended to give repentance as a lifelong grace. Self-denial is the sacrificial dimension of piety by which we learn that we belong to God rather than to ourselves, and we are to learn to yield ourselves and everything we own to God as a living sacrifice. While self-denial focuses on inward conformity to Christ, cross-bearing centers on outward Christ-likeness. If Christ’s life was a perpetual cross, ours also must include suffering. Cross-bearing tests piety, Calvin said. Through cross-bearing, we are roused to hope, trained in patience, instructed in obedience, and chastened in pride. Through a proper estimation of this life, believers learn that they are stewards of this world and recognize that God is the giver of every good and perfect gift. Thus, they are called to unconditional obedience to God’s will, which is the essence of piety.

For Calvin, piety involves the entire life of the devout believer and the entire family of the church community. Living piously means dedicating every minute to living coram Deo (in the presence of God) with intense consciousness, realizing that we must yearn for God every minute of our lives.

How urgently we need to recover this kind of pious living—and how richly Calvin’s own life models it for us! When Calvin died, Theodore Beza wrote, “Having been a spectator of his conduct for sixteen years…I can now declare, that in him all men may see a most beautiful example of the Christian character, an example which it is as easy to slander as it is difficult to imitate.”

Through Calvin’s influence, theology always pursued piety, for protestant theology and spirituality focused on how to live the Christian life in solitude with God, in the family, in the fields, in worship, and in the marketplace. Few today realize the importance of this comprehensive piety. A few years ago, when I studied Calvin’s view of piety for a chapter in the Cambridge Companion to Calvin, I asked one of the world’s leading Calvin historians how I should commence my study. Her response was, “Why would you want to study that outdated subject?” Though sadly neglected, comprehensive piety, as much as anything else, is what makes Calvin so important today.

(Taken with permission from Joel Beeke’s, Calvin for Today)